


It Feels Like Sinking When I’m Standing In One Place (So I Look to the Future and Book Another Flight)

by pro_fangirl



Series: Things You Said [3]
Category: Foyle's War
Genre: Gen, Job propositions, Light Angst, Moving, Picnics, Started writing, bon appétit, had a breakdown, i don't know what happened, it's mostly dialogue, my attempt at light banter, this story has very little plot, this was much more long and dramatic than I intended it to be
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-01-31
Packaged: 2021-03-17 15:42:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,382
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29102736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pro_fangirl/pseuds/pro_fangirl
Summary: He smiled as she talked, waving her hands around emphatically. “What do you think about London?” he asked after she’d finished speaking.“London?” she questioned, confusion showing on her face at what looked like a major change in subject. “Well, it’s a fine city I suppose. I’ve only been there a handful of times and most of those times were during the war, so it looked like any other weary, bombed out city, but it was nice enough. Why do you ask?”“I have a job interview there tomorrow,” he said.orThings You Said Under the Sky and In the Grass
Relationships: Andrew Foyle & Sam Stewart
Series: Things You Said [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2060319
Kudos: 2





	It Feels Like Sinking When I’m Standing In One Place (So I Look to the Future and Book Another Flight)

**Author's Note:**

> Title taken from Seven by Sleeping At Last (a great song to listen to while reading to set the mood). 
> 
> Set between season five and six. Spoilers for 2x02 "Among the Few."

“Something on your mind?”

Andrew tore his gaze away from the sandwich he was supposed to be eating and focused on Sam who had put down her own sandwich and was staring at him quizzically.

“It’s just you’ve barely said a word all day and you’ve been staring at that sandwich for two minutes, and I thought you might be thinking about something.” She took another bite of her sandwich and when he hadn’t responded by the time she finished chewing, she continued, “You don’t have to talk about it of course, if you are thinking of anything I mean. But it’s a beautiful day and quite a nice lunch, and it’d be a shame to just sit in silence the whole time.”

He smiled as she talked, waving her hands around with the sandwich still in it. “What do you think about London?” he asked after she’d finished speaking.

“London?” she questioned, confusion showing on her face at what looked like a major change in subject. “Well, it’s a fine city I suppose. I’ve only been there a handful of times and most of those times were during the war, so it looked like any other weary, bombed out city, but it was nice enough. Why do you ask?”

“I have a job interview there tomorrow,” he said.

He didn’t know what he expected her reaction to be, but the fleeting look of sadness followed by a forced smile wasn’t it. “Oh. Well, Andrew, that’s wonderful,” she said, but he could tell her heart wasn’t in it.

“Really?” he asked, wincing when it came out more sardonically than he had meant it. “You don’t look too happy about it.”

“Well I suppose if you got the job, you’d have to move to London, and well, I’d miss you, that’s all. I’m sure your father would miss you too,” she added hastily.

“There’s no guarantee I’m going to get it. As you well know, going to one interview doesn’t mean you’re going to be hired.”

She groaned. “Don’t remind me. I’ve been to far too many interviews in my lifetime.” She seemed to perk up a little then, the smile coming back to her face. “I’m sorry for acting so dismal about it. It really is wonderful. What job is it for?”

“Lloyds bank. It's a stockbroking job.”

“Oh. Not a job as a poet, then?”

She laughed, and he frowned good-naturedly. “Don’t tease, Sam.”

“I’m not teasing! You know you really should write it all down. Make a collection of your poems. I could type it for you like I’m doing for your father’s book.”

This time it was he who laughed. “Considering what my father says about your typing, we’d both be old and grey by the time you finished.”

“Hmm, well, I suppose he’s correct.” She took another bite of her sandwich, finishing it off. She pointed to his sandwich which lay wrapped and uneaten in front of him. “Are you going to eat that?”

He shrugged. “I’m not very hungry. It’d be a shame if it went to waste though.”

Sam nodded enthusiastically. “Oh, definitely.”

“I suppose I could give it to the birds.” He waved his hands in the direction of a clump of trees where a flock of starlings had gathered.

“I suppose you could. They might not enjoy it though, and then it’d be a waste of a good sandwich.”

He picked up the sandwich and hefted it in his hand. “If only there was someone here who would eat it.” Sam straightened up in anticipation, and he tossed it to her, laughing. “Enjoy.”

“We’ll split it,” she said. “I can’t have you going hungry. Your father would kill me.” She split the sandwich in half, biting into one half and handing the other half to him.

They sat there in silence for a few minutes, enjoying the sandwiches and each other’s company. He thought it remarkable how quickly they’d settled back into each other. After his apology and proposal that they start again, he’d expected it to be awkward between them for a little while, but apparently a sincere apology had been all Sam had been looking for because after that night, besides dancing around some topics (the letter, the other girl, his first two botched apologies, etc.), they’d acted like two good friends.

“So, why London?” she asked after they’d both finished their sandwiches.

“What?”

“Why London? Surely you could find a job here in Hastings?”

“Oh,” he said, gazing down at the blanket they were sitting on. There was a loose thread in the corner and he played with it, wrapping it around his finger and watching it uncurl. “That’s what Dad asked when I told him.” He hadn’t given a straight answer then, mumbling something about better opportunities and good pay. It technically wasn’t a lie, but it hadn’t been the whole truth either, something he knew his father had sensed, but not commented on.

“Oh, and what did you tell him?”

He shrugged. “Better opportunities. Good pay.”

It seemed that while both his father and Sam had seen through him and knew that there was a deeper reason behind his decision, the difference could be found in that Sam wanted to continue the conversation and his father was willing to be more of a silent listener if he wanted to talk, as evident in the fact that Sam frowned at him and said, “Is that all?”

The loose string he was picking at finally snapped. He threw it into the grass.

“Andrew?” Sam looked worried now. “Are you alright?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “When I was in the war I would have given anything to be back home. Not necessarily in the beginning. I was excited then, but after I’d flown enough times, seen enough of my friends killed or injured, killed enough people,” his voice cracked on the word killed, but he continued, “after I knew that war was hell, I hated it. You saw me that night when I went AWOL. I was tired, I’d had enough. But now that the war is over-” he sighed and suddenly he felt like throwing something. He clenched his hands together instead. “I miss it, Sam. I hate that I miss it, it’s just that I’m so restless. I need to do something, Sam. I can’t just sit around all day and fish or wander around town or read by the fire. I need to accomplish something unrelated to that bloody war.” He sighed, rubbing his temple with his fingers. Sam was looking at him with the same unbridled kindness she’d had in her eyes the night he’d gone AWOL and shown up where she’d boarded a room. “I’m sorry, Sam,” he said, “I don’t know what’s come over me.”

She reached out tentatively to grab his hand. “It’s alright, Andrew. I don’t think you’re the only one who feels like this. When I volunteered at SSAFA, I met many a young man who felt the exact same way as you do.”

“Wonderful,” he scoffed, pulling his hand out from hers. “At least I’ll have plenty of friends when I’m admitted into the insane asylum.”

“Don’t talk like that, Andrew. There’s nothing wrong with you, you’re just adjusting, that’s all. We all are. The war’s only been over a couple weeks. We’ll all need time to get back to normal.” She paused a moment, looking deep in contemplation. “You never said why you had to go look for a job all the way in London. Surely you could do some good here.”

“I could, the only problem is, well, that it’s here.”

“I’m terribly sorry, but I don’t think I’m following.”

He sighed. “This hill that we’re sitting on right now, I used to go sledging on it with Rex Talbot, you knew him, he was-”

“The one who was killed, yes, I remember. He was a good friend of yours, wasn’t he?”

He nodded. “For as long as I can remember. I used to go sledging with him and my friend Charlie here. They’re both dead now.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Sam was looking at him with those kind eyes again, and he hated it. Hated that he was alive to see those eyes and others weren’t.

“That’s not all,” he continued, memories of young boys' faces flooding his mind. “There was a kid named Dan in my year at school. Brightest kid in the class. Killed by a sniper at Normandy. There was a kid a few years younger than me who sang in the church choir. His name was Benjamin. Lost a leg his first day in combat. I can’t go anywhere in this blasted city where there isn’t some connection to some boy who didn’t make it home, or if he did come home, he was missing an eye or an arm or a leg. And I can’t stand it. I want to go somewhere where I don’t know anybody. London would be a fresh start.” He slumped back, leaning to lie against the hill, all the anger rushing out of him as soon as it had come.

“Do you think it will hurt less if you move there?”

He lifted his head up to meet Sam’s gaze. “What?”

“Do you think it will hurt any less in London than it will here?”

“Maybe. Maybe not.” He shrugged. “But what do I have here anyway, Sam? Nothing but painful memories. There’s nothing for me here. Might as well move.” 

Sam straightened and her mouth settled into a thin line conveying displeasure. “Andrew Foyle, what a terrible thing to say! There is plenty for you here. You have your friends, even if they are a little worse for wear. You have memories of your mother. You have your father, who I daresay would miss you a great deal if you left. And even if you had none of those things, you would have me. Now moving to London is all well and good, but if you’re only doing it to escape your problems, then I think you’re doing it for the wrong reason.” She sat back, crossing her arms over her chest, looking fierce but beautiful as her blonde hair glowed in the light of the sun, making it look like her head was on fire, and once again Andrew marveled as to how he could ever have given this woman up.

“I’ve still got you, have I?”

She blushed. “Yes. And you always will. Probably. If you’re not a cad. Look, I’m not trying to tell you that you shouldn’t move to London, even if I would mi- we all would miss you. I just want you to be clear of the real reason you’re moving there.”

“And you think you know what my real reason is?”

“I think you’ve changed, Andrew, but you’re still trying to fit back into who you were before the war started because that you wasn’t angry, and wasn’t hurt, and hadn’t seen what you’ve seen. I think you think that you can be that person if you have a fresh start. That’s your real reason. And not that fresh starts are bad, but, Andrew, you can’t go back. You just have to accept that you’ve changed. I know that it’s hard because accepting you’ve changed means accepting the hurt and the anger and the restlessness. Look, you said you missed the war. I think you miss it because it gave you purpose. And now that it’s gone, that purpose is gone as well. But if you accept that who you are has changed, then you can move on, find something else to drive you, a different purpose. And maybe that is in London, but maybe it’s here, Andrew.” She stopped talking, drawing in a deep breath. A faint blush colored her cheeks as if she’d never meant to talk so much and was slightly abashed that she had.

He looked at her and smiled (and if he blinked back a tear or two as well, no one needed to know). “You are a marvelous woman, Samantha Stewart.”

“Don’t joke, Andrew.” She tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear, and started fiddling with the blades of grass near her hand.

“I’m not joking. You want me to stay, I’ll stay.”

He was slightly startled by the aghast look that came over her face. “Andrew, don’t just stay because of me. You missed the whole point of my speech. I’m not saying don’t go to London.”

“I’m not just staying because of you. There’s all the other reasons, like you said. My friends, the memories of my mother, my father. And you.”

“Andrew-” Sam’s tone was cautionary, a don’t-go-where-I-think-you’re-going-with-this voice. But he had already rained in, content to let the matter rest there in strictly friendly territory.

“I didn’t miss the point of your speech, Sam. I understood it perfectly. Thank you. I mean it. I’m honored to call you my friend, Sam.”

She smiled. “And I you, Andrew.”

They veered back into easier conversation then, nothing about war or moving or jobs. They talked about simple things, like the smell of his mother’s paints back when she was alive, or the first (and only) time Sam had tried ice-skating, and how the sky was such a pretty blue.

\---

Later that day, after dropping Sam off and going on his customary walk around the neighborhood, he returned home to find his father carefully fixing the hooks on his flies.

“Mind if I join you tomorrow?” he asked, pouring himself and his father the last of the scotch Kiefer had gifted them.

“Not at all.” Dad looked up from the fly, taking the proffered glass. “Thank you. I, uh, thought you were taking the train into London early tomorrow though. The interview.”

“I’m not going to go. I think I’ll stay in Hastings. I’m sure I can find work here.” He settled into a chair by the fireplace.

Dad cast him a quizzical look. “You, uh, saw Sam today, didn’t you?”

“Yes. What does that have to do with anything?”

Dad shrugged, focusing his attention back on the box of flies. “Nothing at all. Glad you’re staying.”

“Me too, Dad,” he said quietly, more to himself than to his father. “Me too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Originally the prompt for this one was Things You Said Under the Stars and In the Grass, but I tweaked it to better serve my purposes.
> 
> Also, I know that the reason they have Andrew in London in the latter seasons is because the actor couldn't come back, but I took the idea, made it more dramatic, and ran with it. 
> 
> In case anyone was wondering, sledging is what people in Britain call sledding.


End file.
